Use Of Imagery In Sweetheart Of The Song Tra Bong

The author, Tim O'Brien, is writing about an experience of a tour in the Vietnam conflict. This short story deals with inner conflicts of some individual soldiers and how they chose to deal with the realities of the Vietnam conflict, each in their own individual way as men, as soldiers.

In this chapter, we know the story of Norman Bowker, he realizes when he return from the war, he has nowhere to go and he can’t forget about the war. By telling the story about Norman Bowker after getting back from the war. “ Norman Bowker smiled. He looked out across the lake and imagined the feel of his tongue against the truth. "Well, this one time, this one night out by the river ... I wasn't very brave."(4) this show Norman Bowker try to distract himself by talking to his father try to forget about the war but the only thing he can talk is about the war. Even he try a different way “Here, Norman Bowker would have squinted against the low sun. He would have kept his voice cool, no self-pity "But the worst part," he would've said quietly,

Norman Bowker keeps his thoughts to himself, because of his difficulty expressing his emotions. He could not find the words to show and tell others how he felt from his experiences from the war. In doing so Bowker carries all the damage that war can do to a man during and after the war. The crucial healing process that includes telling one’s stories and thoughts of the war was something he could not do properly. Bowker had a possible chance of some therapy through the story in the book from O’Brien, but the story is not told in the correct way to Bowker’s true feelings, and leads to his emotional burdened death.

In the short story, “Sweetheart of the Song Tra Bong,” by Tim O’Brien, the author shows that no matter what the circumstances were, the people that were exposed to the Vietnam War were affected greatly. A very young girl named Mary Anne Bell was brought by a boyfriend to the war in Vietnam. When she arrived she was a bubbly young girl, and after a few weeks, she was transformed into a hard, mean killer.

Bowker is unable to erase the memory and asks O’brien to write his story. “Notes” tells O’brien’s view on Bowker enhanced by the fact that Norman Bowker ended up killing himself ten years after the war. By working on his story and perfecting it in order to make it carry his feelings about Vietnam and Bowker and Kiowa, O’Brien makes peace with his memories of them. He writes in order to remember in a way that is not painful. Therefore, he originally leaves Kiowa’s death out of “Speaking of Courage,” he ends up putting it back in because he realizes it is an essential part of understanding Bowker’s despair of Kiowa’s death and realizes that it was a hard subject for him as well afterall. “Norman is back in the story, where he belongs...the central incident-our long night in the shit field along the Song Tra Bong-has been restored to the piece.It was hard stuff to write...In the interests of truth, however, I want to make it clear that Norman Bowker was in no way responsible for what happened to Kiowa.”(154) We then go into the third chapter of Kiowa’s death, “In the Field”. “In the Field” addresses how an experience with

Anything can change a person if they are not ready for that change. The short story Sweetheart of The Song Tra Bong, in Things They Carried, by Tim O’Brien represents this by showing change in Mary Anne, who is a character the reader probably would not expect to see in a book about the Vietnam War. There are many parts show the change in her from the average high school girl she used to be into a predatory killer, but there is only one reason for her change, and that is the war itself.

This literary device is being used when he states, "I see a young Negro boy. He is sitting on a stoop... The stench of garbage is in the halls. The drunks... jobless... junkies are shadow figures of his everyday world". The use of imagery throughout his passage is to evoke emotions like empathy, from his audience. It allows his audience to be able to establish a connection with the images he portrays, and for the audience too also be able to understand how desperately social change is needed in the United States. Another example of imagery would be where he states," black people, brought to this land in slave ships and in chain, had drained the swamps, built the homes... to lift this nation from colonial obscurity to commanding influence...". He uses imagery to put the audience into the Black community's hoes, so that they are able to comprehend that the way Americans are treating them is not right and needs to be changed because they also made the nation great. He is further persuading his audience for social

Imagery is identified in “Sunrise Over Fallujah” to emphasize the dark tone throughout the book. “I seen a 240 take a guy’s leg off from a 100 yards...The whole leg came off and the sucker was just laying there on the ground, looking at his leg as he died” states a big-headed corporal (chapter 2 pg 37-38). His statement describes a gruesome scene of someone dying. This allows the audience to envision what it would be like to fight in Iraq/Afghanistan and puts them in the perspective of a soldier's shoes, part of unit that is most hated.

Norman, a strong guy, could not save him not for lack of strength, but instead because of complete chaos around him, and “the worst part […] the smell” (O’Brien, 139). After the firefight was over, guilt set into Norman that would never leave. He blamed himself for Kiowa’s death, and it riddled him with self-doubt. After the war, he is completely unable to tell anyone about the incident, and the medal he should’ve won, “he wished he could have explained some of this. How he had been braver than he ever thought possible, but how he had not been so brave as he wanted to be” (O’Brien, 126). His feeling of inadequacy is based on this singular incident, and is something unable to be represented in the NBER study. After the war, Norman lived in the same town he has always lived in, yet he felt like a stranger: “the town could not, and would not listen. […] It had no memory, therefore no guilt” (O’Brien, 137). Norman feels alienated from society, wracked with guilt for a situation beyond his control, he finds his only solace is in the taking of his life. Tim O’Brien uses the suicide of Norman Bawker to represent the extremes of post-war trauma of veterans as a whole. Norman is a stand-in for every soldier who comes home from the war feeling as if he could have done more. Norman’s home town, a sleepy town in middle America with, “stone patios with barbecue spits and grills, and wooden shingles” (O’Brien, 131) represents America as a whole and its uncertainty of how to

Imagery, detail, and symbolism play a crucial role in this work. Imagery has the function of painting a picture of the situation in the reader’s mind so that he or she is able to develop a version of the story individually. It makes the reading a more personalized experience that helps the reader to understand what’s going on. When O’Brien was just about to escape to Canada to avoid being drafted, he described the scene that was presented in front of him. “The shoreline was dense with brush and timber. I could see tiny red berries on the bushes.” In this quote, the reader can visualize the setting of the lake where he has to make his life-changing decision. It appeals to the visual sense by describing the shoreline and even the sense of

The author uses imagery to interest the reader in her story that may seem mundane without the imagery. An example of this happening is when Jeannette is going to her new school in Welch it was her first day and the teacher picks on her because she did not have to give the school her records to her not having them as that is happening a tall girl stabs her out of nowhere“I felt something sharp and painful between my shoulder blades and turned around. The tall black girl with the almond eyes was sitting at the desk behind me.

Change In The Things They Carried a war novel by Tim O'Brien, we are told many short stories compiled to make a whole. I want to emphasis on the importance of the chapter "Sweetheart of the Song Tra Bong". In this chapter we are introduced to the character Mary Anne. She shows the changing power of Vietnam, that a sweet innocent young girl can come into this land and be forever consumed by her surroundings. The speaker show us this through character action, character description, dialogue and metaphor; this enhances the literary work by showing us that the soldiers will always be a part of Vietnam no matter how hard they try to get away from it.

In the chapter "Speaking of Courage" Norman Bowker claims that he is responsible for his friend's death. However, in the chapter "In the Field" O'Brien places the blame on an unnamed young soldier who started the enemy attack by turning on his flashlight. Which story is true? Does it matter what is true? According to Jim Neilson, the story of Kiowa's death "evokes the notion that for the U.S. Vietnam was a quagmire; his drowning functions almost emblematically to suggest America's deepening entanglement in southeast Asia" (193). Whatever the meaning behind Kiowa's story, it certainly fits the requirements for a good war story: there is nothing redeemable in it. Maria Bonn sees the three stories about Kiowa's death ("Speaking of Courage," "Notes," and "In the Field") as exemplifying "O'Brien's relentless investigation of how to tell a true war story" (paragraph 39). When you look at all three of these chapters together you can see the progression from what is imagined to what is true or is it the other way around? With Tim O'Brien, it is never clear.

Norman Bowker, “otherwise a very gentle person” (9), carried a diary and a human thumb that Mitchel Sanders gifted to him. The diary is representative of his gentle or even compassionate nature. Whereas, the severed finger of the sixteen-year-old boy represents his need to toughen up in the reality he was living in—where innocent looking sixteen-year-old kids carry rifles and ammunition. Rat Kiley is the medic and carried comic books, brandy, and a medical supply satchel with morphine, plasma, malaria tablets, surgical tape and M&Ms. Kiley’s youth is captured in his desire for comic books and candy. Kiowa is an American Indian steeped in tradition. A devout Baptist, Kiowa carried an illustrated New Testament from his father, a feathered-hunting hatchet from his grandfather, moccasins, and his grandmother’s distrust of white men. Lee Strunk’s slingshot and tanning lotion are representative of an outdoorsy, adventurous boy. This is further shown when he comes out of the dreaded tunnel “grinning” (8). Finally, protagonist Jimmy Cross is the platoon leader and carried a compass, maps, code books, binoculars, a .45 caliber pistol that weighs almost three pounds, strobe light, two photographs of Martha, a good-luck pebble, and the responsibility for the lives of his men. Jimmy Cross is sentimental and his love for Martha, whom he hoped was a virgin, represented Cross’ youthful innocence.

O’Brien’s use of imagery allows him to paint a vivid depiction of the horrors experienced by the foot soldiers in Vietnam. These horrors perpetuate the physical and emotional